JORHAT, August 3: The Tocklai Experimental Station here, reputed to be among the foremost and best tea research centres in the world, is all set to add more zing to the 'cuppa' that cheers. In the words of Tea Research Association Chairman Abani Borgohain, 'the best-ever clones ever developed by this premier tea research organisation are presently undergoing commercial trials.' Reputed to be sturdy and qualitatively superior to existing clones in almost all respects, 'the promising aspects of the newly-developed varieties - P - 463 and P - 492 - provided they successfully pass the commercial...

ITANAGAR, August 3: Poor recovery of repayments is the main impediment in the smooth flow of loanable funds in this strategic frontier state of Arunachal Pradesh, according to the state Bank of India officials here. Talking to newsmen here on Wednesday, assistant general manager SBI regional branch, Itanagar, SC Sarkar said one of the problems being faced by the bank in Arunachal Pradesh is the poor recovery climate, which has hampered the flow of loanable funds. However, he said this could be done away with if the state government could initiate step to help the recovery efforts of banks by...

IMPHAL, August 3: Starved by the inadequate supply of small denomination notes and coins, traders in Manipur have adopted a novel way to continue their daily business transactions by issuing objects of their own sweet will in place of coins or small denomination notes. However, for any tourist, either domestic or foreign, it is a matter of surprise when he or she is offered a few pieces of toffees or match boxes in lieu of changes. A trader said a parallel economies running in Manipur following the failure of the Reserve Bank of India to supply adequate currencies from its Guwahati office...

IMPHAL, August 3: The state finance minister, H Lokhon Singh, told The Imphal Free Press this evening over the phone from New Delhi that he was presented a proposal for a complete Central government takeover of the Regional Institute of Medical Sciences, RIMS, to the Union Health and Water resources minister, PK Thakur. Lokhon met the Health minister at his office chamber and informed him of the state government's desire of a Central takeover of the RIMS on the plea that that the state's resources are poor and it is finding it difficult to meet its share of the institute's running cost. The...

NEW DELHI, August 2: The Agriculture Ministry has sanctioned Rs 37 crore to the Assam government for undertaking flood control work provoking some of the Congress members to protest the 'meagre' allocation of funds. Union Agriculture Minister, Nitish Kumar, however, did not feel that the amount was inadequate. He argued that the flood control problem in Assam has to be seen in larger perspective. So far over 4560 km embankments have been constructed and 945 km drainage channels have been created in Assam to tackle the flood problems in the state, he claimed. Kumar was reacting to Paban Singh...